


There were times I loathed your name...

by Adeline_Hatter



Series: Lyrical Anxiety [1]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst and Feels, Based on The Decemberist's song, Caleb's in Love with Nott, Denial of Feelings, F/M, Pining, Unaware that she's kind of in love with him too, Yearning Wizard Man, thought piece
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-11
Updated: 2020-07-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:28:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25201696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Adeline_Hatter/pseuds/Adeline_Hatter
Summary: Caleb would not name the feeling in his chest.
Relationships: Minor or Background Relationship(s), Nott | Veth Brenatto & Caleb Widogast, Nott | Veth Brenatto/Caleb Widogast
Series: Lyrical Anxiety [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1840129
Comments: 5
Kudos: 46





	There were times I loathed your name...

There is fear and then there is her.

There is her and then there is the fear.

Phantom touches that echo down his hands from the days he would hold them, the tingle of his lips at the memory of that soft and sweet press that had lasted barely a second but still held.

He cannot put a name to the feeling that floods him at the sight of her smile, that gets stronger when she laughs or turns it so that smile appears like it is just for him in a conversation, just for him and it doesn’t have a name.

It cannot have a name. 

* * *

  
  


She calls him ‘Lebby’, ‘Cay-cay.’ and a few times refers to him as hers.

He calls her ‘Liebchen’ and ‘Schatz.’, he does not breathe the original definition he’d given for their relationship again. 

Caleb pretends it means nothing, for his feelings cannot have a name.

He cannot name it, for if he names it, it will be much more than fear. 

* * *

  
  


Nott scares him, she scares him because he knows he would do anything to see her smile. 

  
Veth scares him, she scares him because he knows he would follow her anywhere. 

Nott scares him, she scares him because he knows she will push at him until he smiles.

Veth scares him, she scares him because he knows that she could leave and he would not stop her. 

She scares him because he knows he wants her happiness, even if it means sacrificing his own and that… That is a feeling he will never name.

* * *

  
  


He will never let her fall, he will do what he can to keep her safe but keep his distance. 

He delights in using messages and that little copper wire, hearing her voice and her laughter. 

He doesn’t know why hearing her full name stings a little bit- No, he knows why, he won’t put a name to it, never a name to put to it.

It is easier to hide here, in the plains of voided feeling and shallow depths of crushes on people who held some aspect of beauty.

He would make sure that she kept on the path she had expressed she wanted to him, to stand there with her family… 

It scares him sometimes how much he wants to make that happen.

But, Caleb will not name it. 

* * *

  
  


He wonders sometimes if she would object if he called her Nott again, but knows that is selfish of him to ask.

Their names differ like that, she came up with one years ago and liked the name she had been given at birth.

_ Caleb Widogast  _ is a fabrication, a name he made for her and it is the name that became the only one that summed him up to a tee.

The one that would be yelled or screamed, that would have laughter attached to it but was always spoken with quiet honest affection that made his chest tie itself up in the hardest knot one could ever comprehend.

He likes hearing her say  _ Caleb,  _ it hosts inspiration and invention. 

Those were the words that fit. 

But the feeling would never have a name.

* * *

  
  


It doesn’t sting, it cannot  _ sting.  _

It doesn’t have a name, how can it deal damage?

He refuses to name it, therefore it cannot hurt him… 

Can it?

* * *

  
  


He spends too many nights staring up at the ceiling mouthing her name, wondering if it means anything to the Gods up above. 

Lips sliding over the V, a sharp little in take for the E, tongue brushing against the back of his teeth for the T and a small round circle as if he is about to start whistling on the H.

_ Veth.  _

* * *

  
  


It is bizarre how he says two words to her, meets her eyes and it feels like he’s known her all his life. 

Which, he supposes  _ Caleb Widogast  _ has known her all his life, being a name he told her in a prison cell too many months ago to count. 

But he feels like he’s known Veth every moment, despite spending such little time with her in comparison to the rest, the years he doesn’t remember and the time he spent locked up from when he was a teenager to when he was in his late twenties… 

It feels like that doesn’t exist and he just spent time with her, he wants to spend time with her and keep the memory of that time so close in his chest that he may only see it. 

He read stories as a child of beings who were made of two souls, but jealous gods were fearful of what would happen if they rose up and so split them apart into two beings instead of one, leaving the two halves of a whole walking the mortal plain in search of their missing half for the rest of eternity. 

She felt like that for him, but he knew, oh he  _ knew  _ that was not the case for her, she had Yeza, her… Husband, her other half, her familiar soul. 

Things he was not. 

Things he was never going to be. 

The mere idea brought pain to his chest, to his lungs and his head, a pain he would not place a name on because Veth was happy. 

That was what counted. 

* * *

He has always liked her eyes.

Which is strange to say, but it was never down to the shape, or the colour or the size of them, it was always the clear lack of judgement that lingered in them when she looked at him, no judgement but he could almost guess at awe once or twice. 

He could remember, her face as a goblin creasing once in distaste, not for him, for something else, her eyes at narrowed to be just long slits in the middle of a pale amber background in the light, her nose wrinkling and he remembers how much he had thought she looked like a cat. 

There is brief delight when he discovers it was never down to the face she wore, it happened despite the changes in appearance, her eyes would still narrow and her jaw would still set itself in position as she hoisted a weapon to aim it. 

Focused and strangely calm. 

Caleb likes to watch her, but he pretends he doesn’t. 

Veth is bold, she is confident and she is beautiful to him because of it, he supposes it never came down to the physical appearance of her. 

Oh, no.

Caleb watches her for her soul. 

* * *

He is relatively sure that the lock she cannot open doesn’t exist yet as she breaks into rooms with ease and grins when that faint, final  _ click  _ sounds metallic in the air and she pushes whatever it is open.

No… He knows there’s a lock she can’t open, his fingers brush the back of his neck absently when he thinks about this. 

Maybe though, one day… 

* * *

  
  


Loyalty. 

It’s name was loyalty… Wasn’t it?

That’s what it had to be, because he had no other option for it to be anything but… 

_ Loyalty.  _

  
  



End file.
